2007-04-05
Meet Ideas
I was feeling the Thursday sleepies about an hour ago, though my heavy lunch of pasta salad with tuna and spinach and viniagrette (yum!) had something to do with that. Not to mention the fact that a barking dog kept me up most of last night. To stay awake, I started reading the FINA rule book. Believe it or not, it worked. After watching a whole week of world championships, I got curious about how those meets are run and what the requirements are for the pool. Fascinating stuff. (Yes, I could have done some actual work, but that wouldn't be a guaranteed pick-me-up.)
Then I started to think more about an e-mail I got the other day from our esteemed president of Arizona Masters, Doug Adamavich. He wrote to me about a recent comment I made about the lack of masters meets. He wants to have more of them, too.
Here are some ideas Doug suggested:
Sprint meet (50/100 events only)
Relay meet (200/400/800 relays)
SCY distance meet (500/1000/1650)
LCM distance meet (400/800/1500)
I like them all. I had always thought a relay meet would be a blast. Every year in high school and college our conferences held a relay meet as the kickoff to the season. Very fun and offered events we wouldn’t normally swim in meets, such as the 100 IM. For masters, there could be lots of fun possibilities.
What do you guys think? Of course, teams would have to step up and offer the meets. How difficult is it really to organize a masters meet? I helped organize a USA Swimming meet a few years back and it wasn't that bad. Bribe the volunteers with food and you'll have them in your pocket.
I’m glad Sun Devil Masters had their meet last month; it was a nice training meet for me and most others, and probably gave people more opportunities to hone their racing techniques before their big meet, or just break the monotony of endless yards of training.
Send me or Doug an e-mail with suggestions. Or, even better, talk to your coach and ask him or her to find a couple of weekends to host a swim meet.
Then I started to think more about an e-mail I got the other day from our esteemed president of Arizona Masters, Doug Adamavich. He wrote to me about a recent comment I made about the lack of masters meets. He wants to have more of them, too.
Here are some ideas Doug suggested:
Sprint meet (50/100 events only)
Relay meet (200/400/800 relays)
SCY distance meet (500/1000/1650)
LCM distance meet (400/800/1500)
I like them all. I had always thought a relay meet would be a blast. Every year in high school and college our conferences held a relay meet as the kickoff to the season. Very fun and offered events we wouldn’t normally swim in meets, such as the 100 IM. For masters, there could be lots of fun possibilities.
What do you guys think? Of course, teams would have to step up and offer the meets. How difficult is it really to organize a masters meet? I helped organize a USA Swimming meet a few years back and it wasn't that bad. Bribe the volunteers with food and you'll have them in your pocket.
I’m glad Sun Devil Masters had their meet last month; it was a nice training meet for me and most others, and probably gave people more opportunities to hone their racing techniques before their big meet, or just break the monotony of endless yards of training.
Send me or Doug an e-mail with suggestions. Or, even better, talk to your coach and ask him or her to find a couple of weekends to host a swim meet.
